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By J. G. ROSENGARTEN 



REPRINTED FROM 

(Berman Bmertcan Hnnale 

VOLUME V 
1907 



Gift , 



GERMAN ARCHIVES AS SOURCES OF GERMAN- 
AMERICAN HISTORY. 

Paper read before the Pennsylvania German Society, October, 
1907, by J. G. Rosengarten. 

There yet remain many sources of information unexhausted 
as to details of the part played by Germans in American history. 
In the archives at Marburg, still made practically inaccessible 
by the want of interest of the keeper in American history, there 
must be much of value and interest. Every German officer was 
required to make full reports for the home authorities and to 
keep journals for inspection — few of these have been printed. It 
would be well for the Pennsylvania German Society to invite 
co-operation of similar bodies in asking the U. S. Government to 
secure from the German Government access to the Marburg and 
other collections, and to make calendars with a descriptive ac- 
count of the most interesting papers. The Library of Congress 
is having such calendars made in the State Paper Office and other 
record depositories in England, of papers relating to American 
history, particularly that of the Revolution. In a recent volume 
of the invaluable publication, the Report of the English Histor- 
ical Commission, there are detailed descriptions of various mat- 
ters relating to the German soldiers serving with the British in 
this country. There are curious and interesting descriptions of 
the efforts made by the American authorities to secure recruits 
from the German soldiers who were prisoners of war — ^both men 
and officers reported quite fully on this subject, and clearly there 
must have been many successful conversions of the German sol- 
diers into good Americans, for substantial inducements and re- 
wards were held out. We hear from time to time of good Ameri- 
can citizens claiming descent from Hessian soldiers who remained 
and settled in this country, and particularly in Pennsylvania, 



4 German Archives as Sources of German- American History 

Maryland and Virginia, where many of them found homes with 
their fellow countrymen, old settlers, sometimes with relations, 
often with old friends and neighbors in the Fatherland. The late 
Rev. Dr. Morris, of Baltimore, himself an active worker in the 
history of Germans in Maryland, was very proud that he was the 
son of a Hessian who had left the British forces at York, Pa., 
joined the American army and served with credit, and became an 
honored citizen of York. 

It would be interesting to gather the particulars of such 
cases, which must have been very numerous in the aggregate. 
Then, too, the royal masters who had sold their men to Great 
Britain, encouraged them to take leave of their old flag and settle 
in America, for thus all questions of pension compensation at 
home were solved. It would be interesting to know how many 
did so and how many brought family and friends and neighbors 
from the Fatherland to settle in America, and thus started that 
stream of immigration which flowed so strongly and enriched 
the United States with so large a part of one of its most valuable 
elements, our German American citizens. Then again, it has 
often been asked, "What colors did the German troops serving 
with the British army carry and what became of them?" It is 
recorded in the interesting Berufsreise of Madam Riedesel, that 
she saved the colors of her husband's regiment, when it surren- 
dered with Burgoyne at Saratoga, by sewing them up in her petti- 
coats, and thus carried them home. Unluckily, a fire destroyed 
them, together with many of the records of the Brunswick troops, 
in the city of Brunswick. Mr. Gherardi Davis, of New York, has 
devoted much time and attention to the study of the flags carried 
in the Revolution by both American and foreign troops. 
He has recently printed a book of great interest and value on 
the subject. Here in the collection of the Historical Society of 
Pennsylvania, are preserved the almost faded and perishing colors 
of the Anspach regiment, and at West Point and in the New 
York Historical Society there are others. The Rev. Dr. Edward 



German Archives as Sources of German- American History 5 

Everett Hale, an indefatigable octogenarian, remembers having 
seen staffs with German colors, captured at the Battle of Ben- 
nington, where Baum's Heavy Brunswick Dragoons were routed 
by Stark's Militia Sharp Shooters. The colors have long smce 
disappeared, so that they cannot be identified, but the flagstaffs 
are still piously preserved in the Old North Church, of Boston. 
Thanks to the kindly interposition of His Excellency, the Hon. 
Charlemagne Tower, American Ambassador to Germany, the 
effort is now being made in Berlin to secure a collection of repro- 
ductions of all the flags carried by German troops serving in 
America, and if it is only approximately complete, it will be an 
interesting addition to and illustration of Mr. Davis' work. 

At West Point there are also some German flags captured 
by the Americans, and these will no doubt be identified by com- 
parison with the German reproductions. There are some huge 
German Dragoon boots and some arms preserved in Bennington, 
as relics of that victory which so clearly established the superior- 
ity of the American sharpshooter over the trained German soldier, 
for warfare in our mountain country. What trophies did the 
Germans carry home, other than the colored drummers taken by 
Riedesel to Brunswick, where tradition and the writers of 
historical novels have preserved their memory and perhaps exag- 
gerated it? 

A valuable addition to our better knowledge of the actual 
life and surroundings of the German soldiers here, is derived 
from their journals and diaries. To the growing number of 
these personal records, Prof. Learned has added the Waldeck 
Diary, kept by a chaplain of that name and of the Waldeck reg- 
iment. He has enriched the value and interest of the text by 
notes supplied by his own intimate knowledge of the subject, 
and by special research in foreign archives. After all, however, 
when it is remembered that every ofiicer must and many soldiers 
did keep diaries and journals, what we have of them in print is 
a very small proportion of those still in uncatalogued archives 



6 German Archives as Sources of German- American History 

and in private hands. Not long since, one such journal, Captain 
Dernberg's, was printed on the anniversary of a great public 
school in Germany as a tribute to one of its former pupils. It 
is to be hoped that many more will yet see the light, for every 
such diary brings us in close touch with the men and the deeds 
and the events of that heroic time, the war for American Inde- 
pendence ; and as much can be learned from the statements made 
in all good faith of those who tried to prevent it, as from its 
most ardent supporters. In the latest and one of the best works 
on the subject, that of Sir George Trevellyan, it is interesting 
to note the extent to which he has drawn from such sources, 
mostly hitherto unused by the solemn historian of the old school, 
but in the hands of so great a master as Sir George Trevellyan, 
adding entirely new light to the picture he draws of the great 
struggle for American independence. It must be recognized, too, 
that the Declaration of Independence was almost as much one 
for constitutional liberty of England as of America. From 
the peace of Paris, the power of the Crown diminished 
and that of Parliament increased. What influence Amer- 
ican example and experience had on the Germans who served in 
this country, is nowhere distinctly stated, yet there can be little 
doubt that the American War of Independence was a large factor 
in the struggle against Napoleon and the final establishment of 
Germany as an independent power, and later on of its logical 
outgrowth, the German Empire of to-day. Almost every Amer- 
ican pamphlet or book or record of its Congress, was translated 
and published in Germany. Many of these and other contem- 
porary publications have historical interest to-day, as showing 
the trend of political sympathy and opinion of Germany of that 
day, its close and watchful interest in America, and the difference 
between the Hanoverians and particularly the Gottingen Pro- 
fessors, naturally sympathizing with their elector the King of 
England, on one side, and the rest of intellectual Germany on the 
other. 



Gtt'nian Archives as Sources of German- American History 7 

We all remember gratefully Schiller's eloquent diatribes 
against the petty sovereigns who sold their subjects to fight in 
America, against freedom, and in a cause with which they had 
no concern and certainly no reason for hostility. It would be 
interesting to know how many of these German "hirelings" re- 
mained in or returned to this country, and how many other 
sturdy Germans were led to come here as settlers by the favorable 
report of the people and the country in which they had gained 
so little honor, but so much knowledge and experience. The 
large accession of Germans, with all the thrift and perseverance 
and other virtues of the race, may be due, in a large part, to the 
German soldiers sent here without their own consent, to help 
maintain British control. At all events, it would be well to secure 
and preserve all official and personal narratives of their enforced 
visit to America and all the stories of America told by them and 
others on their return. To the patient and persevering researches 
of Dr. Sachse, this Society and the public that reads its pub- 
lished volumes, may well make acknowledgment for the light 
he has thrown on the early history of the sects that came to this 
country of freedom of religious opinion, on the help that Germans 
gave Pennsylvania in the successful founding of this great Com- 
monwealth, and on some of its leaders of thought and action. 

Other workers in other fields of historical research have 
added to our knowledge of the early settlers of Pennsylvania. Will 
not this Society now lend its help to procuring copies, if not orig- 
inal papers, from the German archives and from both private and 
public collections, and add them to the historical material 
now being slowly gathered in the Library of Congress, in that 
of the venerable German Society of Pennsylvania, and in the 
Library of the University of Pennsylvania and in that of the His- 
torical Society — all gradually growing in importance. What 
Seidensticker and Pennypacker have done for early Pennsylvania 
history; what Rattermann, of Cincinnati, has done for the history 
of Germans and German literature in America ; what this Society 



8 German Archives as Sources of Get man- American History 

has done and is still doing for a better knowledge of Pennsyl- 
vania Germans, their history, their religion, their customs and 
their ancestry; what Learned has done for their literature and 
its steady growth and development, all of these and kindred con- 
tributions may well be an inspiration to continued and renewed 
eflfort to collect from all quarters all records of the Germans who 
have so greatly helped to make this nation and much of its his- 
tory. 

There is a large harvest to be gathered of printed books, j lis- 
torical and geographical descriptions, biographies and autobiog- 
raphies, novels and poetry, written by Germans in and on Amer- 
ica, during the long period from the first settlement of Germans 
in this country down to our own day. Hessian and Swabian 
local authors, and others of much wider fame, have written about 
their countrymen in this country, both in war and in peace. Indi- 
vidual collectors have gathered much of this material, but the 
Pennsylvania German Society might well enter this field and 
secure copies of all that throws light on the German settlers of 
Pennsylvania, from the first comers to our own day. 

With the recent development of close and friendly relations 
between the German Empire and the United States, it ought to 
be possible to have access to German archives with their wealth 
of material relating to our own history, national and local. In 
war matters, Kapp and Lowell have given us much in print, but 
they and others have left much still in manuscript. Mr. Ban- 
croft's collection of material for his History of the United States, 
largely collected for him by Kapp, is now accessible in the Lenox 
Library, in New York. Mr. Lowell's admirable book,r/i^ Hes- 
sian Troops in the American Revolution, by no means exhausted 
the wealth of original documents procured by him during a long 
stay in Germany. His representatives would no doubt give per- 
mission to this Society, through a properly accredited representa- 
tive, to make a selection of material to print for the use of stu- 
dents. The English Historical Commission Reports, Doniol's ex- 



German Archives as Sources of German- American History 9 

haustive work on France and the United States, are examples of 
the kind of material that can be found in hitherto hidden archives 
and in collections belonging to individuals. An industrious Swe- 
dish-American, Mr. Amandus Johnson, of the University of 
Pennsylvania, has found in Sweden new material for the better 
knowledge of the history of its early settlements on the Delaware. 
Surely our German students can do as much for us at home and 
abroad. 

An American author, Mr. Henry Charles Lea, has won great 
and deserved reputation, even greater in Europe than in this 
country, by his monumental historical writings; his mastery of 
the subjects he has made his special field of research, is based 
on his large collection of original, mainly manuscript material, 
gathered in Spain and in the countries that were formerly Span- 
ish colonies, in Mexico and in Peru, as well as in Germany, where 
the great university libraries have furnished much hitherto un- 
used material for this greatest of American historians. True, 
it is his ability to know how to use it that has made him so widely 
honored wherever his works are known, but first he had to col- 
lect his sources from afar. 

Is there not a wide field of research and collection open to 
the Pennsylvania German Society and to kindred bodies, a field 
in which new discoveries of old material still remain for the dil- 
igent student? Cannot this Society enlist the co-operation of 
kindred bodies in obtaining copies from the German archives, 
of all documents throwing new light on the history of Germans in 
this and other States? Will not such a task be an inspiration to 
all who are looking for subjects on which to obtain and dissem- 
inate a larger knowledge of our past history, and thus show them 
that patriotism which is the highest honor of American citizen- 
ship, and make known what Germans and Germany have done 
for this country? 

How invaluable would be a diary, even crudely written, by 
a resident of Hesse or any of the small German States, during 



lo German Archives as Sources of German- American History 

the war of the American Revolution, telHng the story of the raiS' 
ing of troops for service in America, of the departure of indi- 
vidual soldiers and organizations, of the reports and rumors 
received at home from the distant soldiers, and of their return 
and welcome home. We have a few diaries and journals kept 
by the soldiers, and even by the officers, and there must be many 
more still in manuscript. Sir George Trevellyan's recent volumes 
of history of the American Revolution show, almost for the first 
time, the state of public opinion in England towards the Amer- 
icans, and there must be material for some similar view of the 
feeling of the German families towards the country to which the 
sons had been sent to subdue a rebellion that found so many 
wann supporters among the Germans in both Germany and 
America. Apart from military records and reports, we want to 
know what was the general drift of sentiment; of public opinion 
there was little or none in those days of German separate and 
bad governments. What was the result of the return of several 
thousand soldiers from a country where, in spite of war, there 
was prosperity for every industrious family, to poor Germany, 
ground down by taxes and hopeless of either political or social 
future ? 

Were not the returned soldiers the best advocates for that 
emigration which benefited both countries? A recent German 
historical novel, dealing with a Hessian soldier, makes him find 
a brother, long before settled in Pennsylvania, who contrasted his 
comfort and prospects with those of the family left in Germany. 
Was not this the condition of many families, who gladly joined 
their friends and relatives across the ocean and thus helped to 
swell the tide of emigration? What the Halleschc Nachrichten 
do for a better knowledge of the religious life of the Germans in 
America, the letters and diaries and journals of German soldiers 
here during the Revolution will do for a more intimate view of 
actual life in this country. 

Professor Learned and Mr. Myers have made an interesting 



German Archives as Sources of German' American History 1 1 

exhibit at Jamestown of charts showing the gradual spread of 
German and other migrations from the North to the South and 
West in Colonial days, and after the Revolution and the Consti- 
tution had opened the whole Union to newcomers. They have 
also gathered many interesting relics of those early days, showing 
the implements of trade in farming and other pursuits. Why not 
try to collect the printed and manuscript material that will show 
how Germany learned to know the boundless resources of Amer- 
ica, and how this country became a prosperous home for the 
thousands of Germans whose descendants still honor their ances- 
try in this and other States. 

Much in the way of research and collection still remains, 
and this Society, proud of its stately volumes of papers on the 
local history and achievements of Pennsylvania Germans, may 
well find a new^ field of activity in inviting the co-operation of 
similar societies. United effort cannot fail to open archives 
hitherto closed, and to obtain from public and private sources, 
much of value and interest for a better knowledge of our German 
settlers and emigrants, and their homes and ancestors and local 
surroundings. Professor Learned has been a diligent laborer in 
this field; his study of the family of Pastorius shows what a 
harvest of facts, hitherto unknown, he has garnered by intelligent 
pursuit of inquiries in Germany. What he has done single 
handed, may well be continued and increased in result by the 
united effort of a body as powerful as the Pennsylvania German 
Society. 

A member of a well known family of Philadelphia, Mr. 
John Frederick Lewis, has gathered material for the genealogy 
and history of his ancestors, Ludwig was the old German name, 
and his research has been amply rewarded by showing how well 
that name deserved honor and won it alike in the Fatherland and 
in the new home in America. Such examples are well w^orth 
bearing in mind as illustrations of what can be done by the Penn- 
sylvania German Society. 



1 2 German Archives as Sources of German- American History 

Let me urge this Society to use its influence, due to its 
activity and the value of its pubHcations, to secure a complete cat- 
alogTje of all the papers preserved in German archives, and in 
private collections, relating to America in its Colonial days, in 
the Revolutionary War, and in the time of that German imnu- 
gration which has been so large a factor in American prosperity. 
The time is ripe for thus harvesting in our national library at 
Washington, all that can be garnered abroad and at home. The 
Pennsylvania Society would thus broaden its field of activity, 
would enlist the co-operation of kindred societies, and would 
make its work national. 

Let me present the contents of a letter from Prof. Charles 
M. Andrews, of Johns Hopkins University, giving a summary 
of the work he is doing to add manuscript sources from English 
archives to the material for history of the United States. 

Prof. Andrews is preparing a Guide to the English Archives 
and is having transcripts from them made for the Library of 
Congress. He has described the first part*of the work in a report 
printed not long since. The work of 1903-4 covered the principal 
collections of English records, in 1905 it was devoted to the 
Colonial Office papers, i. e., the Board of Trade and America 
and West Indies, and included also commercial and colonial cor- 
respondence. In 1906 it covered many of the minor repositories, 
including the Guildhall Library, the Royal Society, Dr. Wil- 
liams' Library, Lion College, Devonshire House, Society for the 
Propagation of the Gospel, etc. In 1907 he completed his survey 
of the Public Record Office, the Audit Office, Commissariat and 
Customs Offices, the Treasury, Solicitor, with a re-examination 
of the War Office, Foreign Office, and Home Office collections, 
the records of the Corporation of London in the Guildhall, the 
Bodleian and the British Museum Libraries. The work was 
originally projected in two volumes, with the title, "Guide to the 
Materials for the History of the United States to 1783, in Lon- 
don Archives, in the British Museum, and in the Manuscript 



German Archives as Sources of German- American History 13 

Collections of Oxford and Cambridge." The first volume is 
waiting for the re-arrangement of the records now in progress 
in England, and is thus postponed for an uncertain time. The 
second volume will appear probably this winter and under an 
independent title. Work. for the Library of Congress will pro- 
vide in the neighborhood of one hundred volumes of transcripts, 
of which a list was given in the Report of the Librarian for 1906, 
PP- I37~9> but many additions have been made since. It includes 
documents from the Bodleian and British Museum Libraries, 
from the Admiralty, Colonial and Treasury papers in the Record 
Office. It also includes papers relating to the Hessian and other 
German allied soldiers serving in this country, from the Treasury, 
Colonial and Audit and Foreign Offices and the British Museum. 
The material is so scattered and much of it so little known, that 
a calendar of it would be very useful to anyone writing the his- 
tory of the German auxiliary troops in America. It includes 
letters, agreements, rosters, descriptions often in minute 
detail, accounts, statistics of losses, killed, wounded and 
captured, of individual losses in battles, as at Trenton, 
regarding which some very important information came 
to light in a volume found this summer in the Audit 
Office, labeled "Acct. of the extraordinary Disbursements, 
to be made good by the Crown of Great Britain, for the 
losses of the Hessian troops from 1776- 1784." These accounts 
are often itemized in great detail, items for sickness, hospital 
charges, repairs to guns, traveling expenses, postage, etc. The 
lists of personal effects, money, jewelry, baggage, lost at Trenton, 
are most interesting. These documents are all in English, but 
many of the others are in German and French. Two volumes on 
"America and West Indies," contain some correspondence with 
Brig.-General Campbell, on the subject of embarkation, and 
among the Foreign Office papers "Prussia," are many letters 
which relate to the attitude of Frederick II. on the subject of 
allowing hired German troops to pass through Prussian or rather 
Hohenzollern territory. What Prof. Andrews is thus doing in 



14 German Archives as Sources oj German- American History 

English archives may well be followed in those in Germany. 
There are i8o volumes compiled by the late B. F. Stevens, now 
in the Library of Congress, forming an exhaustive catalogue 
index of manuscripts in the archives of England, France, Hol- 
land and Spain, relating to America, from 1763- 1783, described 
as "the sole key to the American Revolutionary documents in 
European archives," yet none of those in Germany are included. 
Prof. Andrews, too, limits his "Guide to Material in British Col- 
lections" to be issued by the Carnegie Institution, of Washington, 
to collections in England. Even there he has found material for 
a calendar of papers relating to the German troops in the Ameri- 
can Revolution, described by the Librarian of the Congressional 
Library as "interesting in itself and serving to complete such cal- 
endars now in the Library," although as yet it is limited to only 
a portion of the German troops serving here. It is described by 
Prof. Andrews as "three bundles of papers containing the ac- 
counts of the Hessian troops engaged during the war, 1775- 1779, 
with tables giving the exact names, ranks and numbers of Bran- 
denburg and Anspach forces in America, forming altogether one 
of the most complete rosters of the Hessians that we have. The 
documents are in French, German and English." In the vast 
mass of uncatalogued papers in the British Museum are papers 
relating to the Palatines, in the Lansdowne manuscripts; in the 
New Castle papers there are 17 volumes of Bouquet papers, and 
231 volumes of Haldimand papers, listed in Brymner's Canadian 
Archives; in the War Office records there are "Hessian letters 
with rosters." Prof. Andrews points to the untouched records of 
the Foreign Office, for reports from British diplomatic and mili- 
tary agents in Germany, particularly in Brunswick, Hesse and the 
other states that furnished, as well as those that refused to sell 
troops to Great Britain. What wealth of material must there be 
as yet untouched or only partly known, in the archives of these 
countries, from which much information yet remains to be gath- 
ered. 



German Archives as Sources of German-American History 15 

As an illustration of how much more of ignorance there is 
than of information on German Americans, let me point to a 
paragraph in a recent English book, "Society in the Country 
House," by T. H. S. Escott, formerly editor of a leading English 
magazine, and a voluminous author. This book bears the im- 
print of Geo. W. Jacobs & Co., Philadelphia. In it (on page 356) 
he speaks of Sunday Schools "acclimated at Ephratah, in Penn- 
sylvania, by the descendants of those who had sailed to New Eng- 
land in the Mayflower." Is not such a statement the strongest 
argument in support of my plea for a plan for calendars or de- 
scriptive catalogues of the records preserved in German archives 
touching American history and the share of Germans in it? 



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